


Of Adoration and Ashes

by ShamelesslyPoetic



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Angst With A Bittersweet Ending, Angst and Feels, Bittersweet, Black Virgil Sanders, Chinese Roman Sanders, M/M, You Have Been Warned, blink and you’ll miss it dukeceit and and logicality, more bitter though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 21:49:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29442888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShamelesslyPoetic/pseuds/ShamelesslyPoetic
Summary: In the aftermath of a terrible argument, Roman tries to cross the newfound distance between him and Virgil as despair grasps his heart.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders
Comments: 10
Kudos: 17





	Of Adoration and Ashes

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to my two beta readers for both their encouragement and help with the summary, Will and Aminta. And of course thank you to my ever supportive partner. 
> 
> Warnings: Non-graphic description of sex, starts at “and it wasn’t entirely healthy”, ends at “and then asleep”.

Virgil was giving Roman the silent treatment. 

He had his headphones on, the music flowing faintly out of the speakers as he busied himself with menial tasks in the house and refused to look at his husband. It had been hours, and the more time passed, the more Roman’s chest tightened and the lump in his throat solidified. 

It had to end eventually; Virgil would bore of silence, Roman told himself, but he knew better. Virgil could keep up the cold shoulder for days if he wanted, and those days would chill his bones until he froze, unable to think of anything but the warmth of Virgil’s tender words. Roman couldn’t bear the thought so he thought of something else. 

He thought of hands in his and cuddles and dancing around in pajamas till dizzied giggles bounced off the walls. But even all those lovely memories couldn’t distract Roman from the cloying quiet that infested the dinner table. 

Roman tried everything. Sweet talk infused with sincere, passionate adoration and quips and soft insults that he knew Virgil loved for the affection they radiated. He tried singing obnoxiously loud. He tried clanking his fork against the plate in the way Virgil hated. He tried reaching for his hand but Virgil pulled away before their skin could touch. 

That’s when Roman stopped trying. 

Dejected, Roman wrung his spaghetti around his fork and chewed. Bland. Tasteless. The lavender air-freshener hissed, devoid of scent, despite having renewed the cartridge already. Nothing ever felt the same when Virgil was mad at him, and Roman didn’t know what he’d done to deserve no good music, no vivid colors, no fragrant scents. His senses mourned as acutely as he did, every sensation and feeling hollow. Empty. 

Roman fought back against it as much as he could, but his melancholy brooded an insistent, dark cloud over him. Nothing like his stormy thundercloud as he rumbled and shook up Roman in the best ways possible with strikes of thrilling lightning and rain that gently tapped his skin. No, this was static and heavy. Lonely and miserable and so _cold_. 

But even then, Virgil looked beautiful. His scowl darker than his skin, the space between his brows pinched, his lips twisted to the side and the tips of his fingers blued. Roman gazed upon him for as long as he dared, for as long as Virgil allowed him. And Virgil let him. It was a comfort, no matter how small, and the sight of Virgil had always enchanted him. Nevermind his state or zip-tight lips or brutal tongue or moods. Virgil was always beautiful. 

Roman knew he was being a little dramatic with his slumped shoulders and wistful sighs while looking out the window. He considered rooting in the fridge for some wine but found that he couldn’t bear the thought of anything against his mouth that wasn’t Virgil’s lips, and he didn’t think getting numbingly drunk would do him good either. 

Night settled over them, bringing with it the threat of falling asleep upset with each other. Virgil disappeared into their bedroom with a decisive click, cutting off Roman as soon as he started to call his name. 

Roman wilted. He took to pacing as if it would lighten the churn of dread in his stomach or put a hamper on his panic. It didn’t, and Roman wandered around the house aimlessly, no books or any other form of entertainment catching his eye. 

Despite the weight on his chest he felt light as a feather, floating through the house. The wind seemed to stir around him and his feet grazed the floors. 

Roman was about to round a corner to the living room for the third time when he heard a broken, choked off noise. 

He rushed to his and Virgil’s room, following rapid intakes of breath intercepted by shallow gasps. The door had been dislodged by a gust of wind and Roman absently thought that the hinges needed replacing when they yielded so easily until all coherent thought splattered out of his mind onto the ground. 

Virgil faced away from him, sitting at the edge of the bed. His shoulders quivered, and every sob that tore out of him rattled in Roman’s bones.

“Virgil,” Roman whispered gently, tinged with pain. He couldn’t bear seeing him this way. Roman was desperate, frantically flipping through a kaleidoscope of color and shapes and sound for where he’d gone wrong, for how he’d wounded Virgil so deeply. 

“Virgil,” Roman repeated, pleading. He reached out and paused halfway, his fingers hovering as Virgil sobbed again. Roman stood in the doorway, lost. He didn’t know if he should come in, if Virgil wanted him there at all, but he couldn’t just go when his love was suffering. 

Roman took a leap and stepped in. 

Virgil had a framed photograph clutched in one hand, a hairline crack running across its middle -- a picture of him and Roman taken outside of a theatre with a rainbow of light parting their hair, rivulets of colorful light winding the tips of Virgil’s tight curls, both of them grinning wide as Virgil held up bunny ears behind Roman’s head -- and the other held a phone. 

“I just don’t know what to do,” he said. “It hurts, every time I so much as _think_ about him it hurts like a bitch.”

Roman’s heart seized. He couldn’t hear what the other person was saying, but he knew it was probably Janus. He was the only one Virgil trusted enough to talk about his problems with, but even then he only did that when they’d argued horribly. And they had, but Roman…Roman had hoped it wasn’t _that_ bad. 

“I swear, Jan, it’s like my lungs forget what oxygen is--” Virgil started, but both a question from over the line and the hitch in his own breath interrupted him. “Yes, yes I _have_ been doing my breathing exercises. You don’t need to keep pestering me about that.” 

Roman inched his way across the room, slow and controlled. He stopped by their bedside, too scared to look at Virgil’s face when his words alone held so much pain. 

“Shut up, snake.” For a moment Virgil sounded like himself again, his usual snark breaking through. But then that hollow melancholic quality returned, stifling the pitch and tone of his voice into a flatline. A pause, then. “How’s Remus?”

Roman tilted his head. Last he checked, Remus was doing just fine, off touring with his band, and arranging to get Janus. 

Roman still couldn’t hear the exact words, but he made out a sarcastic quip by the edge it held.

Virgil laughed, wet and joyless. “Yeah, me too.” 

Silence fell over the room, and Virgil’s face held the bitter smile for a long moment before it slipped off his face. 

“It just…sucks,” Virgil breathed. “It sucks so fucking much. I miss him.”

Roman finally faced him, but Virgil wouldn’t look at Roman, his dark, impenetrable eyes angled downwards. Tears streaked tracks of gray eyeshadow down his cheeks. Roman would give anything to erase every sorrowful trace, if only Virgil would let him instead of prolonging the pointless torment for them both. 

_I miss you too,_ Roman wanted to tell him. _Talk to me,_ he wanted to beg. _Please stop ignoring me,_ he desperately needed to say. 

Roman opened his mouth to speak, but Virgil’s voice beat him out. 

“Why did he have to go, Janus?” Virgil sobbed. “Why did I let him leave me?”

Roman startled. Stopped. He peered at Virgil’s face, brows furrowed. “Virge?”

Roman was close enough now, Janus’s calm voice slithering through static. “You can’t keep asking things like that, V, it’s not right to blame yourself. Roman wouldn’t have wanted that.”

“It doesn’t matter what Roman would have wanted!” Virgil yelled, the force of it pushing Roman back a few steps. 

Roman’s pulse pounded in his throat. His mind sputtered, trying uselessly to make sense of Virgil’s jumbled speech. 

“I...I don’t want to think about what he would have wanted,” Virgil continued, gentler, softer. He hiccuped, dropping their picture -- the one he’d knocked off the shelf in the thick of their argument -- in his lap to scrub at his face with his sleeve. “I want him to be _here_.”

“I am!” Roman cried out. “I’m right here, my love!” 

Virgil stared forward, unseeing, tears petering off into scar paths down his cheeks. 

“Virgil!” Roman fell to his knees in front of him and bracketed Virgil’s face between his hands. “Virgil baby, my love, please look at me. I’m right _here_.”

Virgil shuddered, clutching the phone tighter as Janus carried on. Roman couldn’t hear him anymore, his ears ringing with the freezing horror crawling up his spine at Virgil’s glassy gaze.

“Why can’t you see me?” Roman begged. 

In answer only more tears trickled down Virgil’s face.“It’s my fault,” he choked. “It’s my fault that he’s dead.”

 _Dead_. 

The word plunged him into the depth of the oceans as the relentless waves crashed above and left him hopelessly adrift. He scrambled backwards, hands searching for a lifeline. His palms burned against the hardwood floor-- but no, he couldn’t feel any burn. Roman’s chest rose and fell frantically but the _air,_ he couldn’t feel it in his lungs either. Just a hollow whistling. He’d thought…he’d thought it was because Virgil was angry with him, that everything felt dulled and subdued because of it but now...

Roman’s eyes snapped to the mirror. Virgil’s image reflected back to him in all its misery, bunched up sleeves and mourning-eyes and an unforgiving red tarnishing the russet of his skin. And in front of him…nothing but empty air. 

Roman stood up, wobbling as a leaf in the wind, featherlight because he possessed no weight. Because he was _dead dead dead._

Roman stepped backwards, staring at Virgil, and getting further away until he collided with the closed door and found himself on the other side. The unforgiving static wood mocked him. He hadn’t opened it. He’d phased through it like a _ghost_. 

Roman ran into the street, blind.

No. He wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be. He’d been with Virgil, they’d slept in each other’s arms…last night? The night before that? Last week?

Time muddled gray in Roman’s mind, seconds minutes and hours merging together into a thick fog. Memories flashed in distant hazes, rushing in all at once, suffocating him. 

Virgil waking up feeling terrible. Their argument. Harsh words launched at Roman, questioning his love and devotion for Virgil like they were _lies_. Knocking their picture in his mania. Roman snapping back. Virgil crying and asking Roman to leave. Roman starting his car and speeding along the highway, tears obscuring his vision as he grit his teeth and fought the wrenching in his heart, the clawing of Virgil’s words, a truck, a sharp turn to the left and then-

Beams of light shot into Roman’s face and a loud honk pierced his ears. He froze, a deer in the headlights. He waited for the screeching tires, the smell of sour exhaust, the crash, thick sticky blood pooling out under his head when he hit the ground. He waited. The car rammed into him. Nothing happened. 

Roman _screamed_ , but no one heard. Roman stood there, crying out and shaking, but no one stopped to check on him. 

Roman ran. Through faceless streets and nondescript buildings and blurred lights and so many ignorant people -- a world that couldn’t see him. 

The wind howled around him as he willed the cold to bite at his cheeks, his legs to feel some sort of burn, the soles of his feet pounding down to tire, his lungs to strain for oxygen. _Anything_ . Anything to ground him, prove he was alive. _Please please please. I can’t leave him._

Nothing.

A corner rounded, Roman’s gut -- or what remained of it -- turning. The air roiled with biting, acidic energy and he wandered through the street as if compelled until he came to clumps of remaining debris. Splintered glass, silver pieces of metal…a silver that Virgil had insisted on when they decided to sacrifice an extravagant wedding for something more practical. Together.

Roman swallowed, long and hard. Something inside him rose up, bubbling like an eruption of lava. It raged at him to _get out_ because the more he looked, the more he _remembered-_

That fast food joint he’d debated going into to drown his sorrow in food, then deciding against having to deal with the passive aggressively racist guy who owned it. Beside it, the Chinese takeout place Roman always told Virgil wasn’t worth its namesake and that they could always do much better at home, offended that Virgil didn’t trust his cooking would be as good as Roman’s ma’s. Roman would always retaliate that she’d _taught_ him and Virgil would smirk at him, teasing, before leaning in to press a smile Roman could taste like sunlight through cloud cover against his mouth. 

Roman found his own lips had ticked up into something fond and blissful, when his eyes whipped to the last sign he’d seen before crashing. Below it, scattered coal pieces from the truck lined a path for Roman’s gaze. 

Following the bread-crumb trail of dulled black diamonds, painfully reminiscent of Virgil’s heartbroken eyes, red patches that the winter had frozen on the asphalt glinted like rubies through the moonlight. 

Roman stopped dead. 

He…he’d died here. Right here, where his pristine white shoes, once bloody and tattered, stepped. Roman’s head filled with a viscous liquid as something cold and heavy settled inside him, blocking out all else. He continued past the accident site, walking without direction. He stepped on something. _Crack_. An impact that he shouldn’t have been able to make.

Roman looked down but it was too dark, spots cradled his vision or perhaps they were tears -- could ghosts cry? Roman didn’t know. But he could sure feel something coming apart at the seams in his chest. 

_Can a heart still break once it has stopped beating?_

Roman smiled bitterly. Virgil loved that movie. 

Roman crouched down and picked up…a phone? _His_ phone. The case Virgil had given to him somehow still intact. It was a rose gold shade of pink. Roman, straight as a malfatti pasta, had called it “obnoxious” and “stereotypical” and then never took it off for the next three years. 

The shattered screen flickered to life as soon as Roman touched it, glowing a neon white on a set of texts that he could just barely make out through the jagged lines. 

**_Storm cloud 💘_ **

_I love you._

**Read.**

Hurt. Hurt was the first thing Roman felt when he’d read those three words. They were a salve and a burn all at once, stinging Roman’s skin and shaking him to his core. He remembered. Oh, Roman remembered…how tumultuous his grip on the phone had been, how his fingers trembled as he replied. 

_I love you too Virgil, you know that._

A moment later brought Virgil’s response and with it a wounded noise from the back of Roman’s throat that he replicated now. He was no different, death had not changed how Virgil’s words felt. It was…fitting. Beautiful in an ironic sort of way. 

_I do. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it._

_I didn’t mean any of what I said._

**Seen.**

Roman had blinked back tears, biting on his lower lip so he wouldn’t sob. How could he trust that after all Virgil had said? That Roman was faking it, that he didn’t love him, how could he love someone so…pathetic, Virgil had said. And God, he wished he would have trusted Virgil. Ignored the thorny knots winding his body inside and out. If only. 

_I’m an idiot, I’m an idiot please just._

_I’m sorry._

But it hadn’t been enough. That night might have been the worst of Virgil’s break downs, screaming and crying and shoving Roman away, not letting him offer comfort. Usually he would, he’d melt into Roman’s arms and sob. Cling to him. Let Roman pepper kisses all over his wet salty face, over the crown of his head and then some. And it wasn’t entirely healthy, Roman knew it wasn’t, but...he’d ask if Virgil would like him to prove his love a different way, and Virgil...his sweet, still-anxious and quiver-mouth Virgil would go perfectly pliant.

He’d shiver, nod, his hands tightening around Roman as Roman carried him to the bedroom and worshipped him, every delicate brush of his fingers punctuated with words of adoration that left Virgil gasping as much as the burning press of their skin did. Maybe even more. 

Virgil would writhe, sob Roman’s name desperately, squeeze their intertwined fingers like an anchor and kiss Roman so fiercely his head spun. And then...then the hitch of his breath against Roman’s lips would signal the end and his Virgil would fall apart. And then asleep, safe and sound at last, his mind quiet, his face smoothed so that Roman reverently ran his thumb between Virgil’s eyebrows and delighted at the lack of wrinkles there. 

What therapy could match that? Virgil had once asked. 

Roman didn’t regret it, but he’d always feared the tactic would run its course. And he was right. Something was different that night. Roman could never place it. Never knew what set Virgil off so suddenly so much that he wouldn’t let Roman get within two feet of him. 

_Come back to me?_

_We can figure this out._

  
After, even as he thought Virgil was ignoring him, Roman believed they could work through their issues. Get better. Now they’d never get to. Because Roman hadn’t opened that one. He’d never gotten the chance. 

_Roman please._

Roman’s face felt tacky, imagining how anxiously Virgil must have been typing the words. Words that Roman never got to answer. 

_Roman I know you can see this._

_Please, my Roman. I love you._

Roman let out a broken noise as his eyes roved over the words, dropping the phone and burying his face into his hands. A jaywalker passed through his unfeeling body. Roman crumpled to the floor. He sobbed tearlessly, shaking with grief and sorrow and the cold that was the only thing he could feel. 

The world went on around him, cars zipping by and people passing to their loved ones. From the corner of his eye, Roman spotted a bespeckled couple greeting each other with warm hugs that would chase the cold January chill from their bodies, and he sobbed harder -- a choked off guttural sound that brooked no relief. 

How must his poor Virgil be feeling, all alone in that house? Roman couldn’t stand it, the image of his love curled up on their bed clinging to a pillow and blaming himself. 

They could have been better. They could have. Roman would have returned and accepted Virgil into his arms, and they would have found a way to forgive and forget. Get healthy. Now? Now what could Roman possibly do?

The phone vibrated. Roman slowly brought his heavy head up, sniffing as he reached for it. He closed his eyes. Swallowing, he snatched it from the ground and flipped it over. 

Roman forced his eyes open. One line shone back at him. 

_I never meant to let you go_

A second later, the same line. And then again, over and over. 

_I never meant to let you go_

_I never meant to let you go_

_I never meant to let you go_

  
Roman tried to text back, tell Virgil it was alright, that Roman forgave him, but the phone wouldn’t register his fingers no matter how hard he pounded. Roman yelled in frustration, helplessly watching until the buzzing stopped and the phone shut off. It wouldn’t open again. 

Roman let it clatter to the ground and stood up, chest heaving. He looked around him before breaking into a sprint the opposite direction he came. 

He had to get back home. 

Roman was dead. He was dead, and he couldn’t change that. He couldn’t tell Virgil how much he loved him. Couldn’t kiss his hand or wipe his tears away or help him through another break down or flick flour at him while they baked. He’d never get to again. But he also couldn’t leave Virgil alone. And so he ran. 

Alive, his legs leaping long strides had once felt like flying. This was nothing like that. This was _sinking._ Roman couldn’t stop -- he feared the ground would swallow him if he didn’t get to Virgil fast enough.

As their front porch came into view Roman stepped forward and something inside him settled. Bracing himself, Roman retraced back to their room, taking in the state of the house. Roman’s things were still everywhere, his books on the shelf, his jacket on the coat hanger, his perfume on the shoe dresser, his favourite type of wine in the fridge. 

And Virgil…Virgil had set a place for him at the table. 

Roman closed his eyes as he finally reached their bedroom. Faced their door. He lay his hand on the knob though he knew it wouldn’t budge. He didn’t know why he did it. He threw himself forward. 

And there. There Virgil was, shut-eyed and shaking as he wound himself around one of Roman’s shirts -- drenched in a jasmine and peppermint scent, though Roman couldn’t smell it anymore. Virgil used to tease him it was too strong, too floral but he had his face hidden in the neck of the shirt now, rubbing his cheek on it. Roman’s heart ached. 

“Virgil…” he whispered. 

Virgil squeezed his eyes shut so that his eyelids scrunched painfully. He clutched the pillow tighter as a visible, silent sob shook him. 

Roman slowly approached the bed and the closer he got the more Virgil hid away in the shirt and curled up into a ball. Like he would after their arguments, hiding. 

Roman felt another crack crawling up his heart, heavy in his hollow rib cage. 

He sat down on the edge of the bed. Lifted his legs up and slid his arms around Virgil’s waist right under his arms, pressing against his back. He sighed, long and low, and Virgil’s breath stuttered into a sob as he shivered. 

Roman used to be the warmer one, how Virgil stole his hoodies and put his freezing cold feet on him all the time attested. But Virgil was warm now, so warm, and Roman greedily pulled at the gentle fire that extended to him. He rested his forehead against Virgil’s neck, squeezing around his waist.

Virgil shivered again, harder this time until he was shaking, the clattering rhythm of his teeth palatable. Virgil pulled the coverlet over himself as if it could protect him from the frost. 

Roman thought of letting go, of not adding to Virgil’s torment, of letting him move on. 

Another phantom breath. Two from Virgil. A heartbeat Roman could feel where his fingers pressed over Virgil’s wrist. His pulse. Roman’s name whimpered like a prayer or a desperate plea or a cry for help. 

Roman stayed.

All at once it was as if all the pain of the years crashed over them, the weight crushing them both. Virgil’s sobs grew louder, tearing through the air with hitching gasps and hiccups and desperate gulps of air. Roman held Virgil tighter, hoping to soothe him as he ran his cold fingers over Virgil’s arms. Goosebumps rose, Virgil shuddered once more, and then with a final exhausted sob, stilled.

Roman untensed, his limbs thawing by Virgil’s bodyheat who, though his tears kept a steady flow that plinked onto the sheets below where Roman could see them, was quiet. Motionless. 

Faint relief rushed through Roman, though he knew Virgil hadn’t stopped hurting. That he had just tired, spent himself with all the grief and lost memories and moments they would never have wracking through him, and could do nothing but give into the lull of sleep. 

But with Virgil’s back pressed to his chest, warmth seeping into him and tingling across his numb skin, Roman could pretend for just a moment that nothing had changed. That when he kissed the back of Virgil’s neck, Virgil would tilt his head and press his lips to Roman’s. That as Roman held Virgil closer, Virgil would know that Roman was here for him. And would always be, for the rest of their lives.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Valentine’s day ;) 
> 
> Ty for reading. If you enjoyed, be a dear and drop a comment. I worked hard on this. 
> 
> Also! Treat yourself! Get candy! You deserve it! Self love! 
> 
> If you want to, do scream at me on Tumblr @shamelesslypoetic.
> 
> Don’t forget to drink your loving Roman juice.
> 
> See you soon ❤
> 
> \- Elise


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